Observations on hydrocephalus chronicus / by Alexander Monro, jun.

  • Monro, Alexander, 1773-1859.
Date:
1803
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Observations on hydrocephalus chronicus / by Alexander Monro, jun. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    appear to me to admit of a satisfa&ory expla- nation. The form of the skull of the foetus is very different from that of the adult: in the former, it projedls remarkably at the original centres of ossification of its component pieces, and hence the upper part of the skull of the foetus is not of so round a figure as that of the adult. In the adult, those prominences which are very apparent in the foetus disappear, owing to the gradual growth and alteration of the shape of the 'brain, which serves as a mould on which the skull is formed. But as, in consequence of hydrocephalus, the growth of the brain is checked, or in some measure suspended, the brain does not acquire its usual form; and as the brain is pushed outwards from the accumulation of water within it, the pieces of the brain-case, though they increase in size, retain the form they had when the child was born \ and the ossific spiculae, instead of describing poitions of